At its regularly scheduled board meeting last week, the board of the Chinook's Edge School Division directed superintendent Kurt Sacher to investigate further procedures for expense disclosure by trustees and the superintendent.The motion came after the provincial government asked school boards to re-examine their expense disclosure policies.Chinook's Edge already discloses many key expenses for the superintendent and board members in its audited financial statement each year, Sacher said.One option the board could consider would be choosing to disclose some expenses in quarterly instalments rather than on an annual basis, he said.“But this is to go maybe a step forward, so they've directed the superintendent to just look at some options relative to potential policies relative to expense disclosure,” he said.The Alberta School Boards Association is also looking at the issue.“I know that our board is interested in what the ASBA has to say on that. They (the board) want to have a little more of a rationale for why you would do it, what it would look like, what are the options available, what are the implications and the Alberta School Boards Association is working on that on their behalf,” he said.In other news, the Chinook's Edge board voted to give $500 to the local Alberta Teachers' Association unit in support of its request to travel together to the annual teachers' convention in February.Teachers usually travel together from a couple of different locations as a group, which Sacher said adds to the team-building concept as well as taking many cars off the road.“The board is always looking for ways to be supportive of their local teachers and so this was an easy decision for them,” he said.
